Exploring the impact of housing insecurity on the health and wellbeing of children and young people in the United Kingdom: a qualitative systematic review.

BACKGROUND: Housing insecurity can be understood as experiencing or being at risk of multiple house moves that are not through choice and related to poverty. Many aspects of housing have all been shown to impact children/young people's health and wellbeing. However, the pathways linking housing and childhood health and wellbeing are complex and poorly understood. METHODS: We undertook a systematic review synthesising qualitative data on the perspectives of children/young people and those close to them, from the United Kingdom (UK). We searched databases, reference lists, and UK grey literature. We extracted and tabulated key data from the included papers, and appraised study quality. We used best fit framework synthesis combined with thematic synthesis, and generated diagrams to illustrate hypothesised causal pathways. RESULTS: We included 59 studies and identified four populations: those experiencing housing insecurity in general (40 papers); associated with domestic violence (nine papers); associated with migration status (13 papers); and due to demolition-related forced relocation (two papers). Housing insecurity took many forms and resulted from several interrelated situations, including eviction or a forced move, temporary accommodation, exposure to problematic behaviour, overcrowded/poor-condition/unsuitable property, and making multiple moves. Impacts included school-related, psychological, financial and family wellbeing impacts, daily long-distance travel, and poor living conditions, all of which could further exacerbate housing insecurity. People perceived that these experiences led to mental and physical health problems, tiredness and delayed development. The impact of housing insecurity was lessened by friendship and support, staying at the same school, having hope for the future, and parenting practices. The negative impacts of housing insecurity on child/adolescent health and wellbeing may be compounded by specific life circumstances, such as escaping domestic violence, migration status, or demolition-related relocation. CONCLUSION: Housing insecurity has a profound impact on children and young people. Policies should focus on reducing housing insecurity among families, particularly in relation to reducing eviction; improving, and reducing the need for, temporary accommodation; minimum requirements for property condition; and support to reduce multiple and long-distance moves. Those working with children/young people and families experiencing housing insecurity should prioritise giving them optimal choice and control over situations that affect them.

'When I came to university, that's when the real shift came': alcohol and belonging in English higher education.

While young people's alcohol consumption has fallen sharply in the United Kingdom and other high-income countries, universities remain places where heavy drinking is routine and normative. Drawing on interviews with undergraduate students, this article explores how heavy drinking is part of how students negotiate a sense of belonging and form personal relationships. Theoretical work on belonging and relationality is used to make sense of students' encounters with alcohol. Consistent with the decline in youth drinking, several interviewees had limited experience of heavy drinking prior to university, and some were not interested in taking it up. After describing how heavy drinking facilitates belonging in certain spaces of student life, we examine the strategies of non- and low-drinking students in navigating these spaces. Attending to their strategies suggests that becoming known as 'social persons' is key to negotiating belonging without drinking heavily. We conclude by considering how universities might better accommodate the desire for belonging for the increasingly large proportion of students with limited experience of or desire for alcohol by creating opportunities for students to form personal relationships in ways that do not involve alcohol or where alcohol is peripheral to the activity.

Young people's views and experience of diet-related inequalities in England (UK): a qualitative study.

Inequalities in diets contribute to overall inequalities in health. Economic inequality and inequalities in access to healthy food are key drivers of poor diet and ill health among young people (YP). Despite mounting evidence of structural barriers to healthy eating, less is known about how YP view and experience these inequalities where they live, and how to address them. To explore YP's perspectives on the drivers of diet-related health inequalities, we conducted three interlinked focus groups with YP aged 13-21 years from six youth groups across three geographical areas in England. We analysed the data inductively and deductively using reflexive thematic analysis and generated themes by examining how social structure, context and agency interact and impact YP's diet. YP were aware of how inequalities in employment conditions impact their families' income and ability to eat a healthy diet. They cited the high availability of hot food takeaways in their local areas as a significant barrier to healthy eating but did not support closing or restricting these outlets. They held strong views on policies to tackle diet inequality and showed a nuanced understanding of the strengths and limitations of universal and targeted approaches. Our study showed that YP have an awareness and understanding of food as important in relation to health, and of diet-related inequalities. However, further efforts are needed to shape and promote policies that resonate with YP and address both their health and wider social concerns.

'It depends on where you were born here in the North East, there's not really many job opportunities compared to in the South': young people's perspectives on a North-South health divide and its drivers in England, UK.

BACKGROUND: Improving the public's understanding of how regional and socioeconomic inequalities create and perpetuate inequalities in health, is argued to be necessary for building support for policies geared towards creating a more equal society. However, research exploring public perceptions of health inequalities, and how they are generated, is limited. This is particularly so for young people. Our study sought to explore young people's lived experiences and understandings of health inequalities. METHODS: We carried out focus group discussions (n = 18) with 42 young people, aged 13-21, recruited from six youth organisations in England in 2021. The organisations were located in areas of high deprivation in South Yorkshire, the North East and London. Young people from each organisation took part in three interlinked focus group discussions designed to explore their (i) perceptions of factors impacting their health in their local area, (ii) understandings of health inequalities and (iii) priorities for change. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, most discussions took place online (n = 15). However, with one group in the North East, we carried out discussions face-to-face (n = 3). Data were analysed thematically and we used NVivo-12 software to facilitate data management. RESULTS: Young people from all groups demonstrated an awareness of a North-South divide in England, UK. They described how disparities in local economies and employment landscapes between the North and the South led to tangible differences in everyday living and working conditions. They clearly articulated how these differences ultimately led to inequalities in people's health and wellbeing, such as linking poverty and employment precarity to chronic stress. Young people did not believe these inequalities were inevitable. They described the Conservative government as prioritising the South and thus perpetuating inequalities through uneven investment. CONCLUSIONS: Our study affords important insights into young people's perceptions of how wider determinants can help explain the North-South health divide in England. It demonstrates young people's contextualised understandings of the interplay between spatial, social and health inequalities. Our findings support calls for pro-equity policies to address the structural causes of regional divides in health. Further research, engaging young people in deliberative policy analysis, could build on this work.

A latent class analysis of international change and continuity in adolescent health and wellbeing: A repeat cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: Since the early 2000s, there have been marked trends in adolescent health and wellbeing indicators across Europe, North America and Australia. In particular, there have been substantial declines in youth drinking. We know little about how these trends are underpinned by co-occurring indicators within individuals. This paper aims to analyse change over time in how indicators cluster within individuals and differences in these patterns between five countries with different trends in youth drinking. METHODS: We analysed four waves of repeat cross-sectional survey data from 15-year-olds in England (n = 5942), Italy (n = 5234), the Netherlands (n = 5408), Hungary (n = 5274), and Finland (n = 7446), which were included in the Health Behaviours in School-aged Children (HBSC) study between 2001/02 and 2013/14. We defined clusters of individuals using multigroup latent class analyses which accounts for change over time. The class indicators included health behaviours, attitudes, wellbeing and relationships. We modelled associations between class membership, sex, and family affluence over time. RESULTS: We identified four classes in all countries: Overall unhealthy, Overall healthy, Moderately healthy and Substance abstainers with behaviour risk indicators. The proportion of adolescents in the Overall unhealthy class declined between 2001/02 and 2013/14 by between 22.8 percentage points (pp) in England and 3.2pp in Italy. The extent to which indicators of health and wellbeing changed as linked clusters differed across countries, but changes in alcohol consumption, smoking, drug use and sexual activity were typically concurrent. Adolescents with low family affluence were more likely to be in the Overall unhealthy class in all years. CONCLUSIONS: Improvements in indicators of adolescent health and well-being are due mainly to concurrent declines in drinking, smoking, sexual activity, and cannabis use, but these declines are not consistently associated with improvements in other domains. They have also not led to reductions in inequalities in indicators of health and well-being.

Geographies of alcohol and generation: Examining the decline in youth drinking in England through a spatial lens.

INTRODUCTION: While international literature addresses the links between youth culture and the decline in youth drinking, little research has engaged with scholarship on youth geographies to more fully disentangle these links. This article explores how the decline is connected to shifts in where young people access and drink alcohol. METHODS: Qualitative interviews were conducted with young people aged 12-19 (N = 96) and 29-35 (N = 17) years in England. The interviews explored the place of alcohol in everyday life, with younger participants discussing the present and older participants discussing their youth in the late 1990s to early 2000s. Data were analysed thematically. FINDINGS: Buying alcohol in shops and licensed premises was a common experience for older participants when they were teenagers but few younger participants discussed buying alcohol from commercial settings. Older participants also reflected positively on drinking in outdoor public spaces whereas younger participants, particularly those from working-class backgrounds, regarded this as morally suspect. Young participants instead accessed alcohol from parents and siblings, and often consumed it in their or others' homes in supervised or moderated ways, seeing this as positive and normative. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION: Spatial shifts in young people's drinking away from public spaces and toward the home appear an important part of a wider trend that renders youth drinking as increasingly moderate, risk-averse, incidental and mediated by parents, rather than excessive, transgressive and integral to youth culture.

Young people's experiences of physical activity insecurity: a qualitative study highlighting intersectional disadvantage in the UK.

BACKGROUND: Intersecting socioeconomic and demographic reasons for physical activity (PA) inequalities are not well understood for young people at risk of experiencing marginalisation and living with disadvantage. This study explored young people's experiences of PA in their local area, and the associated impacts on opportunities for good physical and emotional health and wellbeing. METHODS: Seven local youth groups were purposefully sampled from disadvantaged areas across urban, rural and coastal areas of England, including two that were specifically for LGBTQ + young people. Each group engaged in three interlinked focus groups which explored young people's perceptions and lived experience of PA inequalities. Data were analysed using an inductive, reflexive thematic approach to allow for flexibility in coding. RESULTS: Fifty five young people aged 12-21 years of different sexualities, gender and ethnicity took part. Analysis yielded four themes: PA experiences across spaces; resigned to a lack of inclusivity and 'belonging'; safety first; complexities in access and accessibility. Young people felt more comfortable to be active in spaces that were simpler to navigate, particularly outdoor locations largely based in nature. In contrast, local gyms and sports clubs, and the school environment in general, were spoken about often in negative terms and as spaces where they experienced insecurity, unsafety or discomfort. It was common for these young people to feel excluded from PA, often linked to their gender and sexuality. Lived experiences or fears of being bullied and harassed in many activity spaces was a powerful message, but in contrast, young people perceived their local youth club as a safe space. Intersecting barriers related to deprivation, gender and sexuality, accessibility, disability, Covid-19, affordability, ethnicity, and proximity of social networks. A need emerged for safe spaces in which young people can come together, within the local community and choose to be active. CONCLUSIONS: The overarching concept of 'physical activity insecurity' emerged as a significant concern for the young people in this study. We posit that PA insecurity in this context can be described as a limited or restricted ability to be active, reinforced by worries and lived experiences of feeling uncomfortable, insecure, or unsafe.

The impact of the newly developed school-based 'Digital Health Contact'-Evaluating a health and wellbeing screening tool for adolescents in England.

INTRODUCTION: Supporting adolescents with their health and wellbeing is an international public health priority. Schools are well placed to universally detect unmet health needs and support pupils. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of a digital health and wellbeing screening tool, called the 'Digital Health Contact' (DHC) implemented in schools in the East Midlands of England. The DHC, delivered by Public Health Nurses (School Nurses) (PHN(SN)), aims to identify pupils with unmet health needs (via a 'red flag' system) and provide appropriate support. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Using data from 22 schools which took part in the DHC and 14 schools which did not take part, across three academic years (2018-2020), we conducted a controlled interrupted timeseries analysis with negative binomial regression to explore the effect of the DHC on the number of annual referrals to PHN(SN). Using DHC data from 164 pupils, we further conducted a Difference-in-Difference analysis to explore the impact of 'red flag' and referral via the DHC in Year 9 (age 13-14) on the number of red flags in Year 11 (age 15-16). RESULTS: Across all schools, the mean annual number of referrals increased over the three year follow-up period. In the adjusted model, the number of referrals was comparable between schools taking part in the DHC and non-participating schools (0.15 referrals [95% CI -0.21, 0.50]). Red flag score was not significantly different among Year 11 pupils, after being referred via the DHC in Year 9 (-0.36 red flags [95% CI -0.97, 0.24]). DISCUSSION: The DHC, and similar screening tools, have the potential to raise awareness of the health and wellbeing support in schools and provide an additional pathway of referral to this support for pupils with unmet health needs, without replacing the traditional pathway where pupils refer themselves or are referred by teachers.

A latent class analysis of change and continuity in adolescent health and wellbeing in England during the decline in youth alcohol consumption: A repeat cross-sectional study.

In England, the proportion of 13-15 year-olds who have ever drunk alcohol fell from 71% in 1999 to 35% in 2019. Despite substantial research literature studying this decline, we know little about connections with concurrent shifts in wider aspects of health and wellbeing. This paper aims to identify how indicators of health and wellbeing cluster within 15-year-olds in England, identify changes in clustering over time, and explore associations with sex and family affluence. We used latent class analysis of cross-sectional data from the Health Behaviours in School-aged Children study (n = 5,942; four waves 2001/02-2013/14). Classes were defined by indicators of substance use, sexual activity, diet, exercise, school-related measures, e-media use, parental relationships, and wellbeing. We identified three classes, which we labelled Overall unhealthy, Substance abstainers with behavioural risk indicators, and Overall healthy. The probability of being in the Overall unhealthy class fell (2001/02: 0.39; 2013/14: 0.18) while the probability of being in the Overall healthy class increased (0.21 to 0.41). The probability of weekly alcohol use fell in all classes (e.g. Overall unhealthy: 0.71 to 0.28). Females (female vs male OR: 1.74 95%CI: 1.30 - 2.34) and those with low family affluence (high vs low family affluence OR: 0.18 95%CI: 0.08 - 0.44) had significantly higher odds of being in the Overall unhealthy class. Overall, adolescents became more likely to have co-occurring indicators of good health and wellbeing, including reduced alcohol consumption, sexual activity and cigarette smoking. However, girls and those from poorer families remained more likely to have poor health and wellbeing.

Conducting school-based health surveys with secondary schools in England: advice and recommendations from school staff, local authority professionals, and wider key stakeholders, a qualitative study.

BACKGROUND: Improving the health and well-being of young people is a public health priority. Schools present an ideal setting to implement strategies to improve young people's health and well-being. A key strategy involves conducting surveys to assess student health needs, inform interventions, and monitor health over time. Conducting research in schools is, however, challenging. Schools can find it difficult to participate and adhere to research processes, even when they are keen to be involved in research, because of competing priorities (e.g., attendance and educational achievement), as well as time and resource constraints. There is a lack of literature on the perspectives of school staff and other key stakeholders working in young people's health on how best to work with schools to conduct health research, and in particular, health surveys. METHODS: Participants (n = 26) included members of staff from 11 secondary schools (covering students aged 11-16 years), 5 local authority professionals, and 10 wider key stakeholders in young people's health and well-being (e.g., a school governor, a national government member), based in South West England. Participants took part in semi-structured interviews that were conducted either over the phone or via an online platform. Data were analysed using the Framework Method. RESULTS: Three main themes were identified: Recruitment and Retention, Practicalities of Data Collection in Schools, and Collaboration from Design to Dissemination. It is important to acknowledge the role of local authorities and academy trusts in the English education system, and work closely with these when conducting school-based health surveys. School staff prefer to be contacted about research via email and in the summer term, following exams. Researchers should contact a member of staff involved in student health/well-being, as well as senior leadership, during recruitment. Data collection during the start and end of the school year is undesirable. Research should be collaborative with school staff and young people, consistent with school priorities and values, and flexible and tailored to school timetables and resources. CONCLUSIONS: Overall the findings demonstrate that survey-based research methods should be school-led and tailored to each school.

The role of family in supporting adherence to diabetes self-care management practices: An umbrella review.

AIMS: Synthesize a review of reviews of the family's role in supporting adherence to diabetes self-care management practices (DSMP) for adults with type 2 diabetes (DM2). DESIGN: An umbrella review. DATA SOURCES: Scopus, Web of Science including MEDLINE, CINAHL via EBSCO, PubMed and Science Direct were searched for systematic reviews from their year of establishment until June 2021. REVIEW METHODS: The review followed the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) guidelines for umbrella reviews. The JBI data extraction form for systematic reviews and research syntheses was used for data extraction. Methodological quality was assessed using the JBI Critical Appraisal Checklist for Systematic reviews and Research Syntheses. RESULTS: Nineteen reviews met the inclusion criteria. The key findings were summarized using a narrative and thematic analysis methods. Four main themes were identified: family interactions and diabetes self-management, family support as informal social support, factors affecting families' roles, and tailoring culturally sensitive family-based interventions. CONCLUSION: There appears to be a consensus regarding the impact of family on adults' self-management of DM2. Additional research is needed to comprehend the role of the family in underrepresented populations and examine what constitutes a family and the diverse family functions in different groups. IMPACT: Enhancing adherence to self-care management practices is crucial for the well-being of adults with DM2. Family support is a key to successful self-care management at home. However, understanding the unique needs of adults with DM2 and their families can help healthcare professionals plan appropriate support strategies and sustainable family-based interventions. NO PATIENT OR PUBLIC CONTRIBUTION: This review did not incorporate direct patients or public input as it summarizes evidence from previously published systematic reviews.

Implementing a regional school health research network in england to improve adolescent health and well-being, a qualitative process evaluation.

BACKGROUND: There is an increased need for prevention and early intervention surrounding young people's health and well-being. Schools offer a pivotal setting for this with evidence suggesting that focusing on health within schools improves educational attainment. One promising approach is the creation of School Health Research Networks which exist in Wales and Scotland, but are yet to be developed and evaluated in England. METHODS: This qualitative process evaluation aimed to identify the main barriers and facilitators to implementing a pilot School Health Research Network in the South West of England (SW-SHRN). Semi-structured interviews were conducted with school staff, local authority members, and other key stakeholders. Interview data were analysed using the 7-stage framework analysis approach. RESULTS: Four main themes were identified from the data: (1) 'Key barriers to SW-SHRN' (competing priorities of academic attainment and well-being, schools feeling overwhelmed with surveys and lack of school time and resource); (2) 'Key facilitators to SW-SHRN: providing evidence-based support to schools' (improved knowledge to facilitate change, feedback reports and benchmarking and data to inform interventions); (3) 'Effective dissemination of findings' (interpretation and implementation, embedding findings with existing evidence and policy, preferences for an online platform as well personalised communication and the importance of involving young people and families); and (4) 'Longer-term facilitators: ensuring sustainability' (keeping schools engaged, the use of repeat surveys to evaluate impact, informing school inspection frameworks and expanding reach of the network). CONCLUSION: This study identifies several barriers to be addressed and facilitators to be enhanced in order to achieve successful implementation of School Health Research Networks in England which include providing a unique offering to schools that is not too burdensome, supporting schools to take meaningful action with their data and to work closely with existing organisations, services and providers to become meaningfully embedded in the system.

Using systems thinking to understand how the South West - School Health Research Network can improve adolescent health and well-being: A qualitative process evaluation.

Schools offer a valuable setting to promote good health and mental well-being amongst young people. Schools are complex systems and therefore systems interventions are needed to improve pupil health and well-being. This paper presents a qualitative process evaluation of the South West- School Health Research Network, a systems level intervention. The evaluation is based on interviews with school staff, local authorities and wider stakeholders. Given the complexity of England's educational system there is a need to intervene and monitor health at multiple levels and to ensure close partnership working to effectively improve adolescent health through schools.

Do socioeconomic inequities arise during school-based physical activity interventions? An exploratory case study of the GoActive trial.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate socioeconomic inequities in the intervention and evaluation process of the GoActive school-based physical activity intervention and demonstrate a novel approach to evaluating intervention-related inequalities. DESIGN: Exploratory post-hoc secondary data analysis of trial data. SETTING: The GoActive trial was run in secondary schools across Cambridgeshire and Essex (UK), between September 2016 and July 2018. PARTICIPANTS: 13-14 years old adolescents (n=2838, 16 schools). METHODS: Socioeconomic inequities across six stages in the intervention and evaluation process were evaluated: (1) provision of and access to resources; (2) intervention uptake; (3) intervention effectiveness (accelerometer-assessed moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA)); (4) long-term compliance; (5) response in evaluation; and (6) impact on health. Data from self-report and objective measures were analysed by individual-level and school-level socioeconomic position (SEP) using a combination of classical hypothesis tests and multilevel regression modelling. RESULTS: Stage: (1) There was no difference in the provision of physical activity resources by school-level SEP (eg, quality of facilities (0-3), low=2.6 (0.5); high=2.5 (0.4). (2) Students of low-SEP engaged significantly less with the intervention (eg, website access: low=37.2%; middle=45.4%; high=47.0%; p=0.001). (3) There was a positive intervention effect on MVPA in adolescents of low-SEP (3.13 min/day, 95% CI -1.27 to 7.54, but not middle/high (-1.49; 95% CI -6.54 to 3.57). (4) At 10 months post-intervention, this difference increased (low SEP: 4.90; 95% CI 0.09 to 9.70; middle/high SEP: -2.76; 95% CI -6.78 to 1.26). (5) There was greater non-compliance to evaluation measures among adolescents of low-SEP (eg, % accelerometer compliance (low vs high): baseline: 88.4 vs 92.5; post-intervention: 61.6 vs 69.2; follow-up: 54.5 vs 70.2. (6) The intervention effect on body mass index (BMI) z-score was more favourable in adolescents of low-SEP (low SEP: -0.10; 95% CI -0.19 to 0.00; middle/high: 0.03; 95% CI -0.05 to 0.12). CONCLUSIONS: These analyses suggest the GoActive intervention had a more favourable positive effect on MVPA and BMI in adolescents of low-SEP, despite lower intervention engagement. However, differential response to evaluation measures may have biassed these conclusions. We demonstrate a novel way of evaluating inequities within young people's physical activity intervention evaluations. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: ISRCTN31583496.

Young people's explanations for the decline in youth drinking in England.

BACKGROUND: Youth alcohol consumption has fallen markedly over the last twenty years in England. This paper explores the drivers of the decline from the perspectives of young people. METHODS: The study used two methods in a convergent triangulation design. We undertook 38 individual or group qualitative interviews with 96 participants in various educational contexts in England. An online survey of 547 young people in England, was also conducted. Participants were aged between 12-19 years. For both data sources, participants were asked why they thought youth alcohol drinking might be in decline. Analysis of interview data was both deductive and inductive, guided by a thematic approach. Content analysis of survey responses further refined these themes and indicated their prevalence within a larger sample. RESULTS: The research identified eight key themes that young people used to explain the decline in youth drinking: The potential for alcohol-related harm; Contemporary youth cultures and places of socialisation; The affordability of alcohol; Displacement of alcohol by other substances; Access and the regulatory environment; Disputing the decline; Future Orientations; and Parenting and the home environment. Heterogeneity in the experiences and perspectives of different groups of young people was evident, particularly in relation to age, gender, and socio-economic position. CONCLUSIONS: Young people's explanations for the decline in youth drinking in England aligned well with those generated by researchers and commentators in prior literature. Our findings suggest that changing practices of socialisation, decreased alcohol affordability and changed attitudes toward risk and self-governance may be key explanations.

Creation of a Pilot School Health Research Network in an English Education Infrastructure to Improve Adolescent Health and Well-Being: A Study Protocol.

Schools play a significant role in promoting health and well-being and the reciprocal links between health and educational attainment are well-evidenced. Despite recognition of the beneficial impact of school-based health improvement programmes, significant barriers to improving health and well-being within schools remain. This study pilots a School Health Research Network in the South West of England (SW-SHRN), a systems-based health intervention bringing together schools, academic health researchers and public health and/or education teams in local authorities to share knowledge and expertise to improve the health and well-being of young people. A maximum of 20 secondary schools will be recruited to the pilot SW-SHRN. All students in Years 8 (age 12-13) and 10 (age 14-15) will be invited to complete a health and well-being questionnaire, generating a cohort of approximately 5000 adolescents. School environment questionnaires will also be completed with each school to build a regional picture of existing school health policies and programmes. Each school will be provided with a report summarising data for their students benchmarked against data for all schools in the network. Quantitative analysis will model associations between health risk behaviours and mental health outcomes and a qualitative process evaluation will explore the feasibility and sustainability of the network. This study will create adolescent health data to help provide schools and local authorities with timely and robust information on the health and well-being of their students and help them to identify areas in which public health interventions may be required. SW-SHRN will also help public health professionals focus their resources in the areas most at need.

Exploring young people's perspectives on mental health support: A qualitative study across three geographical areas in England, UK.

Improving young people's (YP) mental health and well-being is a global public health priority. Despite continued commitment within the UK policy agenda to improve the mental health and well-being of YP, the incidence of mental health issues continues to rise. This has been further compounded by the outbreak of COVID-19 which has disproportionately affected YP in the most socioeconomically disadvantaged areas. Understanding YP's perspectives on what supports their mental health is important to develop policies that meet their needs. We conducted focus groups (n = 18 with 42 YP aged 13-21) in three geographical areas with high levels of deprivation in England, UK. Recruited through six local youth organisations, each group of YP took part in three interlinked focus groups designed to explore their perceptions of what impacts their health in their local area, and their understandings of health inequalities through participatory methods. Throughout their discussions, YP foregrounded the significance of mental health and mental health support structures. YP perceived challenges to accessing mental health provision and an unmet need for support within their local communities. Alongside this, YP consistently highlighted the importance of youth groups for promoting good mental health and mitigating challenges to poor mental health. However, ongoing cuts to the voluntary sector and universal services continue to impact areas and individuals in the greatest need. In the face of deficits in formal mental health support, our findings highlight the pressing need for increased investment in services focused on prevention (such as youth groups) in areas of high deprivation.

"There's a lot of stereotypes going on": A cross-national qualitative analysis of the place of gender in declining youth drinking.

INTRODUCTION: Significant declines in drinking among young people have been recorded in many high-income countries over the past 20 years. This analysis explored the role of gender - which we interpret as socially constructed and relational - to provide insight into whether and how gender might be implicated in declining youth drinking. METHODS: Interview data from four independent qualitative studies from Australia, Denmark, Sweden and the UK (n=194; participants aged 15-19 years) were analysed by researchers in each country following agreement about analytical focus. Findings were collated by the lead author in a process of 'qualitative synthesis' which involved successive rounds of data synthesis and feedback from the broader research team. FINDINGS: Our analysis raised two notable points in relation to the role of gender in declining youth drinking. The first concerned the consistency and vehemence across three of the countries at which drinkers and states of intoxication were pejoratively described in gendered terms (e.g., bitchy, sleazy). The second related to the opportunities non- and light-drinking offered for expressing alternate and desirable configurations of femininities and masculinities. CONCLUSIONS: We identified an intolerance towards regressive constructions of gender that emphasise weakness for women and strength for men and a valorisation of gendered expressions of maturity through controlled drinking. Though subtle differences in gendered drinking practices between and within countries were observed, our findings offer insight into how young people's enactions of gender are embedded in, and evolve alongside, these large declines in youth drinking.

An analysis of English national policy approaches to health inequalities: 'transforming children and young people's mental health provision' and its consultation process.

BACKGROUND: A national policy for England, published in 2017, entitled 'Transforming Children and Young People's Mental Health Provision' aimed to address the increasing prevalence mental health problems in children and tackle inequalities. In the context of this policy's implementation as ongoing and the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, the need for appropriate, timely and ongoing national government commitment is vital. METHODS: A narrative review using a problem representation evaluation [1], we critiqued the policy and related consultation documents using a social determinants of health perspective. We also reviewed wider policy discourses through engaging with stakeholder responses, providing an innovative methodological contribution to scholarship on public health policy and health inequalities. RESULTS: We found absences and oversights in relation to inequalities (most notably the lack of acknowledgement that mental health can cause inequalities), access, workforce capacity, and the impacts of cuts and austerity on service provision. We suggest these inadequacies may have been avoided if stakeholder responses to the consultation process had been more meaningfully addressed. We illustrate how 'problems' are discursively created through the process of policy development, justified using specific types of evidence, and that this process is politically motivated. Local policy makers have a critical role in translating and adapting national policy for their communities but are constrained by absences and oversights in relation to health inequalities. CONCLUSIONS: This narrative review illustrates how policy discourse frames and produces 'problems', and how the evidence used is selected and justified politically. This review contributes to the existing transdisciplinary field of knowledge about how using methods from political and social science disciplines can reveal new insights when critiquing and influencing policy approaches to health inequalities.

Exploring the Potential of a School-Based Online Health and Wellbeing Screening Tool: Young People's Perspectives.

Despite high levels of need, many young people who experience health issues do not seek, access or receive support. Between May and November 2021, using semi-structured interviews, we explored the perspectives of 51 young people (aged 13-14) from two schools who had taken part in a novel online health and wellbeing screening programme, the Digital Health Contact (DHC). One school delivered the DHC during home-learning due to COVID-19 restrictions, whilst the other delivered it in school when restrictions were lifted. The DHC was seen as a useful approach for identifying health need and providing support, and had high levels of acceptability. Young people appreciated the online format of the DHC screening questionnaire and thought this facilitated more honest responses than a face-to-face approach might generate. Completion at home, compared to school-based completion, was perceived as more private and less time-pressured, which young people thought facilitated more honest and detailed responses. Young people's understanding of the screening process (including professional service involvement and confidentiality) influenced engagement and responses. Overall, our findings afford important insights around young people's perspectives of participating in screening programmes, and highlight key considerations for the development and delivery of health screening approaches in (and out of) school.